Wanderings of a Lost Key
by darkling59
Summary: What if the blessed dagger hadn't been enough? Vicki comes up close and personal with what it truly means to be a demonic key.
1. Chapter 1

**Title**: Wanderings of a Lost Key  
**Rating**: PG-13 (or thereabouts; depends on the rating system)  
**Spoilers**: This chapter? For the whole of season one. Upcoming chapters might provide more specific spoilers  
**Verse**: Mainly TV, possibly one or two forays into the book  
**Archived**: Currently? At my lj (marozi) as well as on ffnet. Might go to tthfanfic and my home site as well. Please do not archive it without asking permission first.  
**Disclaimer**: Blood Ties and all related characters, scenes, plotlines, etc. don't belong to me but the rest of the story does. Don't steal.  
**Summary**: What if the blessed dagger hadn't been enough? Vicki comes up close and personal with what it truly means to be a demonic key

_**Comments:** This story was born from the 'Ten...[insert random event/meeting/family/whatever...that never happened to...[insert character name' rash of stories on tthf, a crossover site that specializes in BtVS and AtS fics. My point is that it will become a crossover but it will also maintain some sort of plot. It might also cross with the book versions of characters and different time periods (who knows? Maybe you'll get to see Cursed!Vicki meeting Inquisition!Henry X3). Let me know what you think! Reviews are always appreciated. (and yes, I'm aware it's a truly pathetic title)  
_

* * *

**Chapter 1: Difference  
**

She could still hear his laughter echoing inside her head, mocking and chiding as he sliced her hand and squeezed one…two…three long streams of blood into the cursed chalice. He'd been so sure of himself and his master, so foolishly dedicated to bringing Asteroth into the world that he forgot the final ingredient.

A sacrifice.

The enspelled dagger, cursed cup, and demonic tome were nothing without the blood of the key but even the full sequence would not catalyze the demon lord's coming without the ending of a life.

When the time came and the portal opened, Norman realized what he'd missed and decided to kill two birds with one stone; use Vicki as both the key and the life.

Thankfully, he hadn't read the _Grimoire_ and didn't realize just why this would be a bad idea.

But Vicki had.

So even as Vicki fell through the chasm, she fought. Death was what would destroy her world; death would bring the monster to life. So she would not die.

As Henry's pained howl and Mike's scream of denial faded into nothingness behind her and pain became her world, she dismissed everything but herself and her goal.

She. Woud. Not. Die.

Grasping that thought with all her might, she closed her eyes and concentrated, ignoring the burning ache in her hand as Norman physically pulled her through the nothingness between dimensions.

_She Would Not Die._

When Asteroth realized what Norman had done and took hold of his connection to her, dragging her by the wrists with a strength that made her feel like a child, she remembered her friends and ignored what might come.

There HAD to be a way out.

She had cheated death before, she could do it again.

The demonic tome had said a 'marked key' had the ability to be summoned far more easily than any demon because it could feel the call in the 'between spaces' and had no choice but to respond. Vicki was a marked key, thanks to her captors, but why couldn't she feel any summons? There had to be some sort of demon worshiping quack in a nearby dimension…

She began to writhe in panic as the brands on her wrists started to smolder, fighting to keep her cool but beginning to lose it.

She wouldn't die.

She _wouldn't!_

But how couldn't she?

The voice of the demon lord joined his underling's laughter as she fought just outside the gates of hell, determined not to cross but unable to keep herself from it.

_No…NO! I won't betray my world! Someone…anyone! GET ME OUT OF HERE!_

Something snapped.

Asteroth screamed, fading into the distance.

And Vicki Nelson woke up.

* * *

TBC? 


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer etc.: **Refer back to Chapter 1  
**Addendum: **BtVS and all related characters do not belong to me. The concept of the story does. Don't steal. If you do, rabid karmic weasels will sneak into your bed and eat your toes.

**Author's Note: **eheh...so I haven't updated in...two years? More? Better late then never, right? Anyway, this chapter is a crossover with Buffy the Vampire Slayer but no knowledge of that universe is needed in order to read.

**Chapter 2: Summoned**

"Come my dark beast! Awaken! Bow to your master!" A rather tinny, self-impressed voice met Vicki as she waded up out of darkness. Hadn't she just been in hell?

"Shit! Xander, grab him!"

"What? Why me?"

"Just do it!"

"I can't! He's got some kind of force field!"

_Force field? Oh that can't be good._

"Demon, your master commands you to awaken! Why won't you wake up?"

_Sounds like someone picked the wrong…wait a minute…_

"Are you talking to me?" the Canadian PI reluctantly pushed herself up onto all fours, squinting blurrily through her glasses at the bizarre tableau spread out before her. The room was lit only by candles, causing her already bad vision to become even less effective but she could see three large blurry spots that normally signified people. Or light posts but she doubted there'd be any of those inside. Or was she inside?

A swift sweep with her other senses confirmed that she was indeed inside a building. A wooden floor was rough and hard against her hands and the air reeked of incense and blood in a way that never lasted long outside. There was no air current which meant no wind and there were no animal sounds. She could hear three…no, four people breathing harshly, almost as if they'd been fighting.

If anything, the situation reminded her of Asteroth's first appearance.

The irony was sickening.

"My beast! Take your sacrifice; bind yourself to this plain! Then you can attack them and together we shall-!"

"-Rule the world." Her interruption was deadpan and deeply sarcastic. "Aren't any of you idiots _original?_"

One of the other two blurs, the larger one, snickered but fell silent when she rose to her feet, masking her unsteadiness by pretending her slow speed was supposed to be menacing.

"I have summoned you, now you must do as I say!"

"Uh…huh…"she pushed her glasses up her nose and gave the blur on the right her best glower. "I heard you the first time. What do you want?"

"I wish to rule the world! All will bow down before the power of the mighty Insatroof!"

She blinked twice and smirked "Insatroof?"

"Yes! Now take the sacrifice and bind yourself to this plane!"

Her smile dropped at that. She could still remember lying on the floor with an insane college student hovering over her wrists, writing on her with blood in an attempt to call about hell on earth. Someone had been breathing harshly then as well; Correen, tied to a chair mere feet away from the edge of the pentagram awaiting her own fate at Norman's hands.

Vicki's expression darkened as she rubbed her brands in response to the memory. She wouldn't let that happen to anyone else.

"Well? Take her!"

"What?"

"The sacrifice! Kill her!" He seemed to be…gesturing?

"No!" _Finally, the silent duo speaks up._ "Dawn!"

"QUIET!" she actually felt the spell leave the summoner and strike the two watchers, rendering them silent and helpless. "Now take your sacrifice, beast!"

Recalling her own experience, she glanced down reluctantly, expecting to see blood spattered on the floor and a person trussed up like a sacrificial lamb.

She wasn't disappointed.

The 'sacrifice' was a young woman, more a girl really, with long brown hair and terrified blue eyes. She was bound and gagged but the fire behind her fear made it clear she wasn't going to willingly submit to her fate. A silence or immobilization spell was most likely on her as well; that was all Vicki could think of that might have kept her so quiet up until this point.

_Unless she's afraid of me. Miss big bad demon that I am. _The PI almost snickered aloud at the thought but the gravity of the situation wouldn't let her. Slowly, trying to buy as much time as possible, Vicki knelt and lifted the girl into a sitting position leaning against her leg. Her options weren't looking good.

Wait a minute.

"You said I needed the sacrifice to solidify my presence on this plane?"

"Yes! So kill her!"

"So it follows that if I let her go, I'll return to the plane I came from?"

"I…guess so. But you're here to take over this one! KILL HER!"

_Worth a shot._

"Eh…No thanks." Vicki released the girl easily, somewhat surprised to realize she'd almost worked her own way out of the knots. "I was perfectly happy back home, thanks."

Once free, the two stared at each other; captive sacrifice to summoned not-quite-demon.

Then Dawn darted out of the pentagram towards her friends and Vicki felt the dimension slip away.

The last thing she heard was the enraged scream of 'the mighty Insatroof'.

Thank you to all my reviewers! I hope you enjoyed this chapter.


	3. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer, etc.: **Refer back to previous chapters  
**Author's Note: **The background for this segment is a little messed up. At some point, I lost track of the differences between the first book and the first tv show episode so there are elements of both in Vicki, even though she's dominantly from the tv show (considering Asteroth was rather minor in the books...). Just FYI, that's why some of her memories might seem a little screwy. It's not her, it's me. XD

**Chapter 3: The Enemy of my Enemy is...Myself?**

Fading away was a lot less painful than being dragged away, Vicki realized. Not so much a horrible burning pain as an electric tingle.

Distantly, she could feel Asteroth's enraged presence but he hadn't found her yet so she took a minute to rest.

And to realize she couldn't sense Norman.

Suddenly, her brands began to burn.

_He knows where I am!_

She knew Asteroth had found her; she didn't know how she knew but she did. He could not be allowed to kill her.

As his horrible presence drew closer, she cast around desperately, searching for a way out.

_Come on…come on! There's got to be a summoning I can crash somewhere! _A vague recollection of when Norman had summoned Asteroth began to form in her mind.

Then there was a light tug on her wrists, a spin of vertigo, and she was falling to her knees, tangible again and somewhere else. She could almost hear Asteroth's snarl of anger.

_Yes! Now where am I?_

She didn't' get any further than opening her eyes.

"What the f*ck?"

Vicki Nelson met Vicki Nelson's gaze across the pentagram's boundary.

"What, not even the demon knows what's going on?" the other Vicki snarked. Belatedly, Vicki realized her doppelganger was bound hand and foot and missing her glasses. If her vision was anything like Vicki's own, then she couldn't see anything.

"Yes!" the sudden, high pitched shriek made both women jump.

"Norman." Vicki snarled and turned towards his voice then froze, mouth dropping open in shock.

Norman…was not Norman. His hair was bleached blond for one and he was dressed in jeans and a t-shirt rather than that ridiculous leather get up he'd been in last time. And he was hugging a grimoire to his body like a baby.

"What the _hell_ is going on?" she growled after a moment.

"I summoned a demon! I DID it!" he began to dance in short, jerky steps. It would have been comical if he wasn't so obviously and dangerously insane. His actions put Vicki on edge, so much so that she stopped watching her doppelganger completely and backed to the furthest edge of the pentagram, ready to fight but instinctively avoiding him.

"Yeah? Doesn't sound demonic." Her own voice sounded strange coming from someone else.

"Shut up!" Without stopping, Norman directed a vicious kick into his captive's midriff and Vicki winced in empathy at the sound.

"Now, demon, do as I command! Make me Master of all!"

"Wh-."

"Norman, No! You don't have to do this!" her doppelganger again, sounding a bit worse for wear.

"You shut up! This is my fate, my DESTINY!" he was growing more hysterical by the second. "I WILL get what I deserve! I WILL-.!"

"SHUT UP!" Vicki snarled at the room in general, deepening her voice to make herself heard over the yelling.

Both figures outside the pentagram instantly froze.

_Huh. They really think I'm a demon._

"Now, what the HELL is going on?"

"I have summoned you, demon!" sounding less hysterical but just as insane, Norman came forward, clutching the grimoire. Almost as an afterthought, he grabbed the doppelganger by the back of her shirt and jerked her forward with him, forcing her to wobble on her bound legs. "And I have a sacrifice to cement your place in this dimension as my demonic servant!"

"Norman, no!"

Vicki ignored her doppelganger this time.

_A different…dimension?_

"Dimension, huh?" _Might as well play along. _"What's in it for me?"

"I-! Huh?"

"Why should I help you be the ruler of this…dimension? Doesn't sound so interesting to me. And 'Master of All'? What is this, a Disney movie?"

"You…you…NO! The spell said you would do as I said!"

The doppelganger snickered, staring at where she knew the pentagram was but unable to see it.

"Do demons EVER keep their word?" it was directed towards the room in general. The next statement was not. "You're an idiot if you think you can pull this off, Norman."

"Shut up, SHUT UP!" he shrieked, looking at her with clear intent to kill. She must have realized because she started struggling anew but all that accomplished was making her lose her shaky balance and fall over. Norman was instantly standing over her with a knife.

"It will obey me after the sacrifice!" the eyes of both women widened as the knife began to slowly descend; Norman was obviously savoring the moment.

"Norman, you don't have to do this!" his sacrifice was growing desperate. Norman's grin widened.

"He can't do it." He looked at his summoned 'demon' with something akin to betrayal.

"I will finish! You will obey me!"

"THAT won't finish it."

"…What?"

The doppelganger bucked, trying to throw him off, but couldn't get enough leverage. Norman ignored her, still staring at Vicki.

"The book said she's supposed to die!"

"Well, yeah, but…" Vicki thought desperately for something to say. "…but I have to kill her. Since I'm, y'know, the demon?" The other Vicki was watching her suspiciously, obviously having picked up on the lie. Thankfully, Norman was not so observant.

"…Oh."

"Yeah. So she needs to be in here where I can…kill her…and you…uh…"

He was watching her expectantly.

"You…uh…need to light more candles!"

"More candles?"

"Yes." _This is ridiculous. _"You need to make another pentagram in a different room to…er…connect me to the ambient energy." That sounded like something Coreen would say, didn't it?

"The book doesn't say-."

"Who's the demon, me or the book?" she snapped.

He looked at the grimoire uncertainly but nodded and left the room.

Once he was gone, the two women looked at each other.

"So…demon?"

"According to him."

"But not really."

"Not exactly. What's going on?"

"You don't know?"

"How the hell would I know? I just got here a few minutes ago!"

"When he summoned you."

"Apparently."

An awkward silence fell for a moment, one full of questions and suspicions.

"So he could summon you even though you're not a demon."

"Yep." The tone would have deflected a lesser person.

"What are you then?"

"None of your business."

"You're about to kill me! It damn well is my business!"

"Oh, right. Put our hands in the pentagram."

"Like hell."

"I'm not going to kill you." The "_you idiot" _was strongly implied. "I don't even want to be here."

"Yeah?" the doppelganger squinted up at her "Then what was with those instructions you gave Norman?"

"Did those even make sense?"

"Sounded good to me."

"Hopefully they sounded good to him too. Would you hurry up? It'll be better if we finish this before he gets back.

"Finish what?"

"Letting you go so you can send me back home." The bound woman looked suspicious but like she was considering it.

"It's me or Norman."

She grimaced. "Right."

There was no reaction when she stuck her hands through the pentagram boundary, to Vicki's relief. Vicki made quick work of the ropes and her alternate instantly pulled out and untied her legs on her own.

Free, she stood up and stretched, tenderly rubbing the circulation back into her limbs and squinting suspiciously at her double.

"…Thank you."

"Don't get mushy." Vicki snarled. "Just break the pentagram so I can go."

The doppelganger scowled as she wrapped a small throw rug around her arm to use as a sponge.

"Is there any particular reason you sound like me?"

"I am you."

"What?"

"Alternate universe, remember?"

She scowled. "Of course. I suppose you look like me too. You don't see my glasses anywhere, do you?"

"Nope."

"Damn it."

This time, there was no in-between-dimensions time, just a funny fading sensation, spinning vertigo, and a meter high drop out of thin air onto a wooden floor in a candlelit room that, once again, she could barely see.

_I'm going to have seriously bad knees when this bullshit is over. And worse eyes._

"Well now…this is…unexpected." A familiar voice but in an alien tone; never before had it been so darkly seductive, so dangerous, so…evil.

_Shit._

A rush of cold panic drove Vicki to scramble upright, ignoring her bruised palms and knees in favor of shoving her glasses into place. She still couldn't see very well but her new…captor? Summoner?...was making no effort to stay hidden. He was standing just outside the pentagram, watching her intently. The figure he cut was handsome and haughty but his eyes…oh, his eyes.

**"Mike?"**

**

* * *

**

A/N:

**So...that's it**

That's the last chapter I wrote for this story and I don't plan to write any more. I did have a huge outline, one for a crossover fic and the other staying within the Blood Ties fandom, but branching off into AUs.

If you'd like to see this outline (one or the other or both), send me a review or a pm. If I get enough people that want to read it (say...five?), I'll put it on my livejournal account. However, I don't really want to go through the hassle of finding, formatting, and proofreading if no one is interested so...it's your call.

Either way, I hope you enjoyed this little foray into my imagination.

Happy Holidays!


End file.
